Fall 1966
Preface The articles in this section reveal the strength and vibrancy of current Mormon historiography. In December, 1965, in connection with the meetings of the American Historical Association at San Francisco, approximately 100 Mormon historians,…
Dialogue 1.3 (Fall 1966): 29–46
In this early article, Allen shows that the First Vision was not well known during Joseph Smith’s lifetime. It became well known after the Prophet’s death, which is when missionaries started to teach about it for the first time.
Dialogue 1.3 (Fall 1966): 47–62
Understanding Mormon history involves appreciating some of the formidable obstacles which confront throse who seek to write it. There is still sensitivity among Mormons to probing that might bring embarrassment to cherished offical views of Latter-day Saint orgins, martyrs, or heroes.
Polygamy, contrary to popular opinion, probably seduced few men into the seraglio that was Mormonism in the mind of a prurient, Victorian America. Yet it lured several generations of historians — not to speak of…
Dialogue 5.3 (Fall 1966): 85–100
During the years of the Utah Territory, outsiders got appointed to the terrority to serve in various positions. For the most part, these Gentiles weren’t sympathetic towards the church, and one of the more famous outsiders is Chief Justice James B. McKean who tried to crack down on plural marriage.
On Sunday morning, October 5, 1856, Brigham Young stood before thousands of Mormons in Salt Lake City, to open the semi annual conference of the Church. During the morning he spoke twice. His very first…
Almost from its beginning Mormonism was disparaged as funda mentally superstitious and irrational, with an appeal only for the poor and uneducated. Even before the description of Joseph Smith as “ignorant” and “illiterate” by the…
Whenever a young Mormon intellectual attempts to discuss anti-intellectualism within his Church, especially in the broad, 166-year historical context attempted by Professor Bitton, it seems to me that he is faced with at least three…
One might say of Mormonism, as the Apostle Paul said of Christianity in his testimony before King Agrippa, “This thing was not done in a corner.” Before the Book of Mormon was off the press,…
Joseph, according to the record just, angel-riddenand consulted last, what glory may you claim?Was yours a father’s care, but, God-bidden,respect for foster child you could not name?Was your pride greater than any heart-hiddencommon love for…
This is not tragedy. A child Cannot suffer nobly, nor fling a wildCurse at the sky and die. A child can only flinch and cry,Soft hands outspread. No clenched fistFor you, my little one. You are pathos, I…
Lift your withered hands and feelThe rush of words push from below.Lift up your dying hands and write. Trace the lifted arc of wheel Pitting itself against the flow Of earth’s slow water in the night. Force…
This was the dream, beginning with a questFor isolated work, that brought them westTo Salt Lake Valley, looking for new startsAnd land in Zion, pushing stock and cartsOut of the world into Millennium In the Rocky…
Whenever a young Mormon intellectual attempts to discuss anti-intellectualism within his Church, especially in the broad, 166-year historical context attempted by Professor Bitton, it seems to me that he is faced with at least three…
Jonathan Hughes has written a spritely book about those men, the vital few in American history, who have had a major impact on our economic growth. Brigham Young is selected as one of them. Hughes,…
For those interested in expanding our understanding of the phenomena of Mormonism and of Judaism, the appearance of Glanz’s Jew and Mormon should have constituted an event of some significance. Students of the history of…
In a sense this review can be termed an attempt to make much of fairly little, for the amount of space devoted to Mormonism in each of these works is very small — six pages…
The Mormon who reads a text on the sociology of religion such as this one by Thomas F. O’Dea of Columbia University, formerly of the University of Utah, will better appreciate the book if he…
The historian, essentially, wants more documents than he can really use . . . Henry James. The Aspern Papers History is bunk. Henry Ford The books, periodicals, and manuscripts listed in bibliographies are of little value…
A deep feeling of estrangement haunts modern life and literature and thought. The feeling is not at all new to human experience, but in our time we seem especially conscious of it. More men seem…
The following photographs are geographically and, I believe, architecturally representative of early Mormon churches in Utah. I have concerned myself only with existing churches that were built between 1861 and 1905. A truly representative selection…
